Altice scoops Cabovisão from Cogeco Cable

Canadian cable MSO Cogeco Cable has sold its struggling Portugal unit Cabovisão to European media and telecoms investment group Altice for €45 million

Altice holds stakes in Numericable, Est Videocom, Coditel and Completel companies in France, Belgium and other parts of Europe.

The sale was long expected after Cogeco Cable wrote off its entire investment in the Portuguese company. It took a charge of C$225.9 million (€171.4m) to write off the Portugal investment in July 2011.

The company had already booked a C$400-million write-down in 2009, three years after it entered the market with the C$465 million purchase of the Portuguese operations

Recent Portuguese subscription TV figures suggest that Grupo ZON/TV Cabo has the largest market share with 53.9 per cent, followed by PT Comunicações, with some 35 per cent. Cabovisão was third largest, with a share of 8.6 per cent.